YOUNGSTOWN — The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections new mail processing center at 884 Coitsville-Hubbard Road has been receiving and filtering cards and letters directed to prisons across the state since November.

The facility is at the Ohio State Penitentiary on state Route 616 just outside of Hubbard Township.

Patrick Turpack, the facility administrator and program administrator for the site, said the plant receives and digitizes mail addressed to inmates from nine ODRC facilities. He said that number is set to increase to 28 with three new facilities coming online in May.

In digitizing mail sent to incarcerated individuals,the ODRC states it is looking to enhance mail service for its inmates as well as reduce contraband that enters the prison through the mail.

Once the mail is opened and scanned at the Youngstown facility, it is then sent directly to the inmates’ electronic tablets.

“We process it and we scan it through Viapath Command to the incarcerated person’s tablet,” Turpack said.

The mission of the facility is to negate contraband. He said when the contraband is received and used by an incarcerated individual, it can “spark violence” and cause other issues.

Bryant Palmer, warden at the penitentiary, said contraband is a “plague” for every correctional facility across the state.

“Mail is always one way for them to be able to interdict contraband,” he said. “So having a mail center like this where the mail is not actually going to our incarcerated people can help to curb any type of avenue where drugs can be interdicted into the institution. It helps tremendously.”

Tom Horton, public relations liaison for the penitentiary, said prior to digitizing the mail, all the inmates had the actual letters and cards taken to them.

“If you sent it in, we just kind of opened it, did a quick scan, and put it back and delivered it right to the individual,” he said.

Horton said right now, one of the biggest issues with contraband in the prison system is K2, which, according to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration, is a trade name for designer drugs that are intended to mimic THC, the main psychoactive ingredient of marijuana. He said K2 is hard to detect. He said it could previously be sent through any type of letter and then sold or used in the prisons without much risk of detection.

“By opening up this (processing facility) and being able to scan it to them, that eliminates them getting that parcel from their loved one. That will cut down on the amount of K2 that comes into the institution tremendously,” Horton said.

Turpack said the processing facility typically receives hundreds of letters per day. He said Mondays are the busiest, with the facility receiving about 1,000 pieces of mail.

“It varies to 600 to 800,” he said.

Turpack said the facility staffs four employees and the hope is to grow to 15 to 20.

Doug Sollitto, a staff representative for Ohio Civil Service Employees Association and chief negotiator for the union for the department, said the jobs likely will pay around $50,000 with benefits.

Turpack said there were 110 applicants for a recently posted position at the facility.

“This is a business in the community,” he said. “This is the director’s (Annette Chambers-Smith) vision. She wanted this to be a business in the community. We want to grow this … We want to be good partners with the community and we want to hire from within the community.”